


Happy birthday, punk!

by gwevyan



Series: Steve Rogers Week [2]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Fourth of July, Gen, Happy Birthday Steve!, M/M, Steve Rogers Week
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-04
Updated: 2016-07-04
Packaged: 2018-07-21 14:08:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7390282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gwevyan/pseuds/gwevyan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky and Steve go to a 4th of July parade.  Actual plot?  Nooo, you're looking in the wrong place.  Just quick holiday/Captain America Appreciation fluffs!</p>
            </blockquote>





	Happy birthday, punk!

Bucky rubbed his nose under the bridge of the flashy sunglasses Stark had given them. Literally flashy, of course. The dark lenses were surrounded by the words _I ♥ USA!_ on his and cartoon fireworks on Steve's, both complete with blinking red, white and blue lights. Steve's had a little button on one side that played ' _America the Beautiful_ ' when he pressed it, because Stark believed Steve should always come with a soundtrack.

"You okay?"

"Sure." Bucky let the sunglasses settle back into place. "Just these glasses makin' my nose hurt."

"Take them off, then," Steve said.

"Hell, no!" Bucky grinned and jostled Steve's side with his shoulder. "We look fuckin' amazing, you think I'm gonna mess that up?"

Steve tipped his enormous, bearded, glittery Uncle Sam hat at him with a grin.

SHIELD had decided weeks before that any Avengers turning up at any of the major Fourth of July parades or festivals would be too big a security risk to allow, and Bucky could see their point. What more powerful and poignant time to strike at America's greatest defense team than on America's birthday, surrounded by civilians? Steve and Bucky only had a moment to be disappointed, though, before Clint piped up that he wouldn't be around anyway, because he was going home to take his kids to the local town parade.

Bucky and Steve had exchanged glances. Little community street fairs, like the kind they'd grown up with? The ones that still celebrated the basic significance of Independence Day instead of turning it into a chance for department store sales and nightclub specials? They'd asked JARVIS to help them find the best town fairs within a couple hours' drive.

When Stark heard that Bucky and Steve wanted to hit up a few small-town parades instead of watching the big NYC one on tv, he'd clapped his hands to his cheeks in a moment of speechless delight before tearing off to find the nearest StarkPad, shouting orders at JARVIS all the way. He'd come up to breakfast that morning, shoving aside a platter of Sam's patriotic strawberry and blueberry waffles to heave up a stack of boxes onto the table- all full of novelty glasses, t-shirts, socks, sandals, drink holders, scarves, giant foam mittens, and a star-spangled Captain America helmet that Bucky seized for his own.

"Gotta send our uber-American senior representatives out in style," he'd declared gleefully.

Bucky loved the stuff. Steve loved it even more.

"Oh, hey, look." Steve jabbed him with an elbow and pointed down the road. "The kids' parade is starting!"

Bucky leaned in, careful not to get in the way of anyone standing behind them- they'd come early enough to set up a blanket and picnic basket on the side of the street, so nobody was in front of them, but even sprawled out sitting down he and Steve were pretty tall. Dozens of children were coming their way, some in wagons being pulled along by their parents, some on tricycles with the mom or dad walking along next to them. Some were wearing their best white Sunday clothes and waving shyly at the cheering crowds. Others were dressed up in Uncle Sam or- making Steve blush, and Bucky roar with laughter and thump him on the back- Captain America costumes with sacks of candy and were happily throwing out huge handfuls to the first people they saw.

Bucky put two fingers in his mouth and let out a string of piercing, encouraging whistles. Steve whooped along next to him, beaming, only stopping to gather up the candy flung onto their blanket and offer it to the kids next to them. Bucky grinned and shook his head. Seventy years later, still the same old goodie-two-shoes.

"I remember going to street fairs when we were runts," he said, watching a brother and sister in striped outfits doing cartwheels down the block. "We'd go to all the ones all over for miles. We'd save up all our nickels for a few weeks and buy ice cream cones."

"And you'd always save up a few extras and buy me a souvenir," Steve said, all fond and wistful like he gets whenever Bucky brings up an old memory. They've got enough distance, now, both of them, to let themselves forget sometimes how it was being a little hungry now and then, a little cold when they couldn't pay for heat, a little scared some days that somebody would call them out for being too close; instead, when they want, they can just remember how good some things were back then.

"A postcard, or one of those stamped coins, or something like that," Bucky recalled. "So the next time you were stuck in bed all mad at the world that you had to miss so much of it, I could pick those up and show you how much you'd already seen."

"Hey," said a boy's voice behind them. Somebody reached over Steve's shoulder and poked Bucky in the right arm. "Hey. Are you dressed up like Captain America?"

Bucky snorted, glancing up and back. A small knot of teenagers had nudged their way through the crowd and were staring down at him and Steve. "'Course I am," he said, twisting so they could see the shield picture of Steve's face on his shirt- a gift from Stark, of course- and holding up the plastic shield he was using as a popcorn bowl. "It's his birthday, after all.  Even grown-ups can dress up for a birthday party."

One of the girls screwed up her face a little. "Everybody knows that's not actually true," she said, admirably patronizing, Bucky thought, for somebody barely in high school. "That's just one of those things the government made up to make Steve Rogers seem more emphatically patriotic instead of just a soldier following orders."

"The military recruiters needed him to be a zealot to the American cause," a boy said, looking hopefully at the girl, and blushing at red as his zits when the girl smiled approvingly at him.

Bucky bit his lip to hold back a laugh. Next to him, Steve was grinning outright but hollering praise at the parade kids to hide what he was smiling at. One of the other boys, though, scuffed his shoe on the ground and rubbed his neck. The collar of his shirt pulled to the side and Bucky spotted a silver ball chain around his neck.

"My brother really likes the stories, though. He says it doesn't matter if they're true because Captain America's still the hero they all wanna be, and he's somethin' to think about when they're tired or scared," he argued. He nodded at Bucky. "Cool costume, dude," he said. "Jenna, I want kettle corn. You still owe me two bucks from lunch yesterday."

"Oh, _fine_."

The kids shuffled off through the crowd.

Bucky just beamed at Steve.

"Shut up," Steve grumbled. He couldn't hide his smile, though, or the way his eyes were just a little bit watery-bright.

"You heard the kid," Bucky chuckled. "They all still _loooove_ you out there."

"One time, Buck, one damn time," Steve groaned, laughing. "The whole unit was drunk! They didn't mean it like that!"

A Jolly Rancher, thrown by a little girl dressed as Benjamin Franklin, beaned Bucky square off the forehead because he was too giggly to catch it.

"Seriously, though, your face is on my shirt and you're sitting right next to me. How did they not catch that?" Bucky wondered, scooping up the candy and popping it into his mouth.

"Too blinded by your charm and good looks," Steve said blandly, just like he'd always used to say when Bucky still wondered out loud why girls would talk to him but ignore Stevie, standing right at his shoulder. Bucky punched him in the arm, just like always.

"Too blinded by the light of American glory shinin' out of your face, you mean."

"I thought you always said that was shining out of my- hey, look! They're just opening up a strawberry shortcake stand over there!"

Bucky narrowed his eyes, scoping out the potential competition angling towards the stall. "We gotta get over there before the line gets huge."

"You get the food back in the bags, I'll grab the beer chest and the blanket."

"Sir, yes sir." Bucky scrambled to get their snacks stowed away in the old-fashioned wood picnic basket Stark had sent them off with, and dumped his popcorn from his shield back into its sack, rolling up the top and stuffing it into one of the carrier bags. The shield, thanks to Steve's nifty sewing, attached to a pair of white buttons on the back of Bucky's blue jacket.

He'd always been better at sewing than Bucky.  Sewing up rips and holes in their clothes was a job he could  _d_ _o_ , back when he'd been sickly and small, and Bucky had always tried to find things Steve could do as a favor to him so it wouldn't always feel like the other way around.

When Steve followed Bucky into his Army tent that first night, still smelling of smoke, the first thing he'd done was sit down on the ground next to Bucky's cot and darn up all his socks.

"Come on!"  Steve smacked Bucky's shoulder and pushed him along.  "The line's not building up yet. We can go grab some more hot dogs first and watch the clown cars come through."

Bucky grabbed Steve around the chest and hauled him up, slinging an arm over his shoulders.  The sun was shining, they were healthy and alive and together, hotdogs and strawberries and cream were in their imminent future.  "This is a fuckin' awesome day," he declared, squeezing Steve close and trading bright, happy grins.  "Happy birthday, punk."


End file.
